Fanfic #3: Under Attack!
Posted August 10, 2000

Another barrage of fireballs zooming overhead, she ducked and rolled for this one. As soon as she got up to her feet she was rewarded with a missile headed straight for her face. A blast of psychic energy and it changed course, blowing up something a ways behind her. She didn’t dare look back, couldn’t afford to turn her back on this enemy.


Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man growled in frustration as his target avoided more of his heavy-weapons fire. Another disintegration beam fired only to meet up with a psychic barrier and do no damage. He had no clue how long Sabrina had succeeded in avoiding pulverization, but it wouldn’t be that much longer.
Sabrina balled up her fist and charged a psychic bolt and shot it at Macho with nearly bullet-like speeds only to knock him back half a step and have it disperse over his armor. This was frustrating, he was too dense to affect with mental-attacks and she couldn’t change him into a doll or anything since that involved changing the target’s perception of things and Action Man was too stubborn for a trick like that. The only thing left was bolts of energy ala Mewtwo and he took those in stride. Of course if it was actually Mewtwo firing them that might not be the case.
Eric and Mike had paid MMGHAM to off various characters way back in the second fanfic, but he hadn’t pinned down Sabrina for a full drag-out fight until now. He’d taken out various cashiers, made Fanboy and Brendan’s last days a living hell, helped against Doompuff, stalled the landlord a few times, and now he was close to taking out the Saffron Gym Leader that had been so intent on Eric and Mike’s deaths not all that long ago.
Another lob of fireballs, this time countered with what might be called a "Psychic whap," sending the fireballs right back at Action Man. Macho charged forward right through the fireballs, which failed to do any damage to his armor. Sabrina started to telekinetically fly backwards to keep distance between her and the charging gun-toting lummox.
‘Action Man fiddled with some controls on Bam-Boom for half a second and then stopped, bracing himself, and pulled the trigger. The resulting firepower discharge was killer, fireballs, missiles, grenades, bullets, ray beams, and other deadly looking things all erupted out of the cannon’s multiple barrels. There was only one course of defense against this attack.
Sabrina teleported a considerable distance away and winced as some barely-standing buildings were reduced to piles of stuff on the ground.
‘Action Man spun around looking for her and was soon charging her way again. She stopped him telekinetically, throwing him straight through a few walls, over a street, and into a building that proceeded to collapse on him.
"Maybe that’ll buy me enough time…" with those words Sabrina started channeling all her energy into a rapidly growing black, crackling sphere over her head.
Four smaller white crackling spheres circling it soon surrounded the main black sphere. With a heave she threw it towards MMGHAM, who had just finished pulling himself out of the rubble and was shaking his head.
The psychic blast tore at the action hero, a sparkling mass of rotating spheres. ‘Action Man fired a few shots into it, but the explosive/penetrating bullets flew right through the psychic energy. The sphere slammed full-force blowing ‘Action Man back as the smaller spheres rained down on him in all directions shooting something not unlike electricity through him.
Sabrina fell to the ground and panted heavily, exhausted from the duel with Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man. Hopefully that would keep him down a whi…forget that, he was already getting back up! Only one choice now, she didn’t like the idea of running, but that lack of dignity was better than being vaporized by a 600lb mega-cannon.
Teleportation!
She had no idea where she was going, but it was away…away from the berserker and the gun. And that, was good enough.
Uh-oh…she could still see the gnawed-up remains of her town in the distance. Not far enough, so she started heading away as fast as she could go. Her head rang with every step and she wasn’t making much speed stopping every now and then to catch her breath.
"Won’t that idiot stop coming after me?!"
Her rhetorical question was answered with a branch flying at her head. Instinct took over and the branch stopped dead and fell to the ground via a short psychic shot. A tree nearby loomed ominously.
"Nooooo….I don’t need this!!"
Roots snapped out of the ground and flew at her. She threw her arms in front of her face and tried to erect a psychic barrier but she was too worn out and was soon wrapped up in the roots. She struggled and kicked but the tree started to reel her in. Slowly being drug to an impending doom Sabrina tried to grab for her last Pokéball, with any luck Kadabra had recovered a little from the beating ‘Action Man had given it not long ago.
Sabrina fired a psychic blast but it was far too weak to hurt a tree, first terror of the Pokébattles universe. She collapsed, barely conscious and no longer fighting as the tree continued to pull her in swaying in the breeze.
Then the world erupted in flame. A set of explosions threw her off her feet, destroyed the roots and sent her rolling down a hill. The rolling turned out to be a good thing as it put out the fire that caught on her. She managed to stop herself, there was the tree, on fire and emitting an aura of anger, and…’Action Man toting Bam-Boom.
"YEAH! I GOT HER!! BOO-YAH!!"
‘Action Man swiveled towards the psychic gym leader and brought Bam-Boom up to finish her off. So this was it…not the best way in the world to die, she couldn’t even leave the world a good-looking corpse dying this way.
CLANG!!
A large branch impacted with the side of ‘Action Man’s head. The tree was angry, and it wanted to fight! MMGHAM turned to face his newest opponent and was rewarded with some apples hitting him. It didn’t phase him of course, hardly anything could get through that armor of his. As he lifted his massive fire-arm to destroy the tree it moved first firing a massive storm of razor leaves. Most bounced off his armor harmlessly, a few left tiny dents in his armor, but one did damage. It managed to hit him in the face through the opening in his helmet for him to see through.
"OW!"
‘Action Man recoiled a bit, putting a hand to his facemask. Despite his low IQ he knew he was bleeding. How infuriating! This tree was going to die!
Forgetting Bam-Boom he charged right up to the tree and punched it with all the strength he could muster. Its remaining roots tore out of the ground and the tree flew backwards crashing into some bushes. The tree somehow came back to an upright position, but then proceeded to run away.

TREE used LEAVE!
TREE left!

Both ‘Action Man and Sabrina stared after it as it left. There are some things you just never really get all that used to.
‘Action Man shook his head and turned Bam-Boom on Sabrina, but just before he fired he heard a voice. Oddly enough it wasn’t Oak or the Narrator.
"WWAAAAAAIIIIIIIIITTTTT!!!!!!!"
Eric ran up to ‘Action Man and promptly sat down, panting heavily trying to catch his breath.
"What? Why wait? I’ve got her right where…"
"Um, I’m calling off the hit on her…"
"What? Um…"
"He doesn’t want her dead anymore" Bam-Boom explained.
"Oh. Ok."
"Yeah, um…she’s not evil anymore."
Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man walked over to where Sabrina was sprawled out on the ground, picked her up, placed her in a standing position and dusted her off a little.
Holding out an armored hand he asked innocently "No hard feelings?"
Deciding that holding a grudge against him would be unhealthy Sabrina took the offered hand and shook it. With that settled she stalked over to Eric, eyes glowing faintly.
"What took you so long?"
"Um, well, I kind of got hung up. That Dark Warrior guy makes pretty good time, and I got lost, and…"
Sabrina’s headache and weariness kept her from actively reading minds, not that she could pick up on the escapee’s anyway, but a single thought shouted out as he rattled off excuses.
"WHAT?!" the scream accompanied a punch to the face.
Eric rubbed his mouth annoyed and glared at Sabrina "What was that for?!"
Sabrina’s eyes lit up a little more and she looked extremely ticked; "YOU WAITED THAT LONG JUST TO SEE ME SUFFER?!"
A slap this time, accompanied with some psychic energy to worsen the blow.
"I HELD UP MY END OF THE DEAL, I STOP THAT DARK WARRIOR GUY FROM CHASING YOU DOWN AND YOU REPAY ME BY…BY…WATCHING MACHO-JERK OVER HERE BEAT THE CRAP OUT OF ME?!!?"
Eric’s face takes yet another blow.
"OW! WHY YOU…"
Eric never got a chance to finish as ‘Action Man stepped between them, moving them aside and then behind him.
"Huh? What now?" Eric asked as he moved sideways to look past ‘Action Man.
Stepping out into view was a clown. Big shoes, red nose, make-up, funny hair, goofy costume, the whole shebang, but…something was off. Maybe it was the accessories, like the bandoleer, and the grenades, ammo clips and the like…

HAC appeared!

Eric and Sabrina were both confused as to this "HAC?"
‘Action Man nodded and said "Heavily Armed Clown."
"How would you know that?"
Bam-Boom answered simply "We’ve dealt with some before."
Just as he finished saying that 5 other clowns stepped into view.<
"It would seem we’re outnumbered" offered Eric, the eternal pessimist.
At just that moment all six heavily armed clowns pulled out an assortment of light full-auto guns. Without a word the clowns opened fire. I mean, they’re psychotic HACs if I remember right, so opening fire for no good reason shouldn’t be out of character…right? MMGHAM’s armor erupted in a shower of sparks as bullets rained down on him, but he held his ground perfectly. Which was fine for Eric and Sabrina as they were both hiding behind him and trying to make themselves as small as possible.
‘Action Man whipped out Bam-Boom and a new look flashed on the HAC’s faces…on some it was slight worry, on others it was envy. Which it was didn’t much matter as he fired immediately.

BOOM!

Where there were once six clowns now stood four clowns and two pairs of smoking funny shoes. The clowns looked down at the remains of their comrades for all of half a second before bolting. Three made it to cover, relatively safe from the zooming fireballs. The fourth was hit with two dead on and vanished in less than a second. The air stank of melted rubber and superheated make-up. ‘Action Man gestured with one hand for Eric and Sabrina to go and started forward, Bam-Boom ready.
Two little red noses fell to the ground with a squeak right in front of two pairs of smoldering shoes. Eric and Sabrina took a second to blink at that occurrence before bolting in different directions.
Sabrina ran for what was once a fully staffed hospital but now served as little more than a shelter for Doompuff survivors. She could guard herself and the other people in that environment, look after the Saffron Survivors and make sure they stayed survivors. Eric on the other hand, ran away off where he hoped he couldn’t/wouldn’t be followed.
A log snapped heavily under ‘Action man’s feet as he continued forward, he’d seen a flash of green hair over in this direction…
AMBUSH!
A trio of armed grenades hit Macho from behind various hiding spots, two from a boulder and one from a dead tree. The force of the explosions knocked him down as he threw up an arm to guard his face. Coughing a few times he tried to wave the smoke away, hearing the cocking of large weapons nearby he fired Bam-Boom in the general direction of the sound.
The gun made a good choice and lobbed an explosive of its own. It hit the rock and exploded, destroying over 80% of it and blowing the remains of the two clowns that had been behind it nearly 100ft.
The last clown’s eyes bugged almost out of his head at seeing this, and deciding himself outmatched, made progress away from ‘Action Man as fast as he could.
A shower of bullets soon slowed his progress though. The clown almost made it, scrambling away with bullet holes in his limbs, desperately trying to make it back to base… He’d escaped the wrath of Bam-Boom…only to run smack-dab into a tree.
"Ooh...that’s not pretty.."
"Indeed it is not. Now, we should head back there might be more HACs around."

And indeed there were for just south of Saffron was a large squad of what could be called "EHACs." Extremely Heavily Armed Clowns, more or less this would just be the main force though, waiting for their scout teams to get back. One team was in the main of Saffron, checking out number of people and such. Two other teams were on the lookout for possible reinforcements on the outskirts of town, but one hadn’t been heard from since they reported they were going to attack a trio in the remains of the surrounding forest.

"Bozo 1, this is Squad Ronald Leader, everything looks desolate here too. Over."
"Ok Ronald Leader, continue downtown. Over."
It wasn’t hard to establish that Doompuff had hit this town hard, most of the buildings were either piles of rubble or had massive holes gnawed into them. The HACs had rounded up quite a few of the citizens into a makeshift jail. Quite a few had resisted and fought, and a number showed psychic powers, but it still wasn’t that hard. One of the eight HACs had fainted and they had nearly 20 prisoners. It looked like taking over this version for Hammy wouldn’t be too hard after all.
In roughly 15 minutes they found the hospital where most of Saffron’s population had gathered and soon determined that it was pretty well defended, they’d wait for the main force.

Two CAMO HACs were up on the top of the building looking for a way in. They’d just found the door but before they could test it out it flew open and Sabrina stomped out, eyes glowing and hair flowing about behind her. Her eyes flashed brighter for half a second and one of the HACs disappeared.
SABRINA used PSYCHIC POWER!
CAMO HAC exploded!
CAMO HAC fainted!
CAMO HAC2 is trying to run away!

The other CAMO HAC was indeed bolting for it, but before he could ever get to the ropes he used to get up Sabrina gave him a telekinetic push and send him flying over the edge and crashing into the ground 5 stories below quite painfully.
"Hey…are you ok?"
"Nooo…I am NOT…ok…"
"I was just asking."
Upstairs Sabrina collapsed to the ground from the exertion she’d been through lately. A slightly shaking Saffron resident walked up the stairs to where she lay and politely asked if she needed help.
"I’m….fine…"
"You don’t look fine. I really think maybe you ought to let me help…"
Her eyes flashed and her voice dropped about 4 octaves when she replied. "I said I’m fine!"
"ERP!" was about all he said before making his way down the stairs fairly quickly.

About half an hour later the main force was mobilizing to take Saffron. Only one of the three teams made it back, the third was taken out by a combo of trees and ‘Action Man just like the first. Only the team that went into Saffron proper made it back, and that was with three "faints." (The one Sabrina made explode is questionable as a faint if you ask me.)
"All right troops, head out!"
Several large combat vehicles, troop transports and a hole bunch of Clowns packin’ heat began to close in on the remains of the city.

A large man holding a nearly equally large gun stood on the hill watching them move in. This was going to be one helluva fight.
"Action Man, don’t you think we should warn the civilians first?"
"Maybe, but those clown’s ain’t getting that close anyway."

And on top of a hill not too far away a mental hospital escapee could see the brewing conflict. A one-man army going up against the real thing. Maybe he shouldn’t have decided to come back after all became a recurring theme in his thoughts.
"Ah, heck. Too late now. I can’t get far enough away in time. Just have to hope my luck holds out…"
With that Eric started jogging for Saffron’s hospital shelter. Sabrina really was the perfect human shield if you asked the MHE, she had enough power to cream most opponents…you just had to be careful that you weren’t too close to her and weren’t too obvious about hiding behind her.

‘Action Man never quite made it to the hospital, as the HACs moved fast and sent a tank shell to meet him.
"OOF!"
One would expect nothing more than maybe a shriek of terror in their last instant of life or perhaps no noise at all except for the explosion when one is hit by a tank shell, but here ‘Action Man merely said "OOF!" when struck by one dead-on. The shell didn’t detonate on impact, throwing MMGHAM into a building through a wall. Then it exploded and caused it to collapse on him. The cheer from the clowns didn’t last long as ‘Action Man’s spiked helmet soon arose from the rubble quickly followed by the rest of him.
Quickly shaking his head and aiming Bam-Boom ‘Action Man’s eyes seemed to flash red just before he said "That hurt."
The tank that hit ‘Action Man exploded most gloriously as it was tore through by a barrage of firepower, sending HACs flying in all directions. More heavy weapons fire continued to tear into the HAC army as they scrambled to hit Macho with all the firepower they had. The HACs were fast and they battered Macho from all sides, swarming him. But still the big guy held his ground and dished out just about as much as he was taking.

"All right people, we’ve got a war going on outside, I think we should all go!"
"How would you know that?"
"Hey, aren’t you that Eric MHE guy?!"
"Yeah! That’s him!"
"Why should we listen to you? They must have put you in that hospital for a reason!"
Eric didn’t have to answer as just then part of the wall exploded and everyone could see quite clearly that there was a very large fight going on somewhere outside.
Eric’s brain kicked in at this point, "Hey, shouldn’t we have heard such a large battle going on?"

NARRATOR wanted CROWD to not believe ERIC and maybe lynch him, so it hit MUTE on the BATTLE!

"Oh. Figures. Anyway, let’s get going!"

CROWD agrees!
CROWD begins to PANIC and lots of people begin to STAMPEDE out!

"STOP THAT!"
The shout from Sabrina commanded immediate silence as everyone stopped.
"Now, leave civilly or you’re going to have me to worry about!"
"Yes ‘m" the crowd tamely conceded.

CROWD leaves in an orderly FASHION!

"Well, you’ve certainly got them well trained."
Eric jumped back away from Sabrina’s fist and went to the door, ushering people out. From helping little kids find their toys and parents to helping old people…Eric didn’t do so great, but he seemed to be trying…I guess that’s what counts. Sabrina marched over to him glaring coldly.
"Just what are you doing here anyway?"
"Well, ton of people about to be attacked by a bunch of HACs, you beat up, tired, and with no Pokémon left what kind of guy would I be to leave you all unprotected?"
Sabrina glared a little harder and only said "Uh-huh…sure" while wondering just how transparent a person could get.
Eric glared back for a second before looking outside.
"Oh my, I seem to have made a miscalculation."
Sabrina stormed over and looked outside herself demanding he explain himself.
He didn’t have to, quite obviously not all the HACs had been fighting ‘Action Man. There was a large group just outside the building that had been glad to help with the evacuation process…by locking everyone up.
"Smooth move breakout boy."
"How could I have known?!"
Eric showed some actual impressive reflex ability just then, as he jumped behind the door and closed it as the HACs opened fire. A few bullets went through the door, but apparently only to the effect of angering it. It pulled itself off its hinges and jumped into the HAC mob, bludgeoning several with its full mass. (DOOR wants to fight! DOOR used ATTACK!) This caused Eric, Sabrina, and the few extras still inside to blink dumbly and stare at the fiasco. They all jumped back in when a rain of bullets flew through the doorway however.

SWAT HACs appeared!

The narrator announced as every window on the first floor exploded inwards marking the arrival of several HACs that roped down and made a movie-swat-team entrance.

HACs and EXTRAS begin to BATTLE!
ERIC is trying to HIDE behind SABRINA!

This was proving difficult though, as they were surrounded. A spin this way, a spin that way, duck under the legs, didn’t seem to matter, there was always a HAC pointing something at him.
Sabrina plastered the wall with one clown before crumpling over to the ground, exhausted.
Eric sighed in frustration and kicked her in the side a couple times, "What kind of human shield do you expect to be this worn out?"
Eric took a nice little trip through the air, creaming a HAC. Getting up he grabbed all three of his Pokéballs and threw them out into the fray.
"Arbok, Jigglypuff, Royal Kingler go! Let’s give ‘em hell!"

ERIC sent out ALL THREE POKéMON!
It’s a very impressive collection!

"My, is that sarcasm I hear your voice drenched with oh all-mighty one?"

Well, if ERIC can’t figure it out, NARRATOR isn’t going to tell him!

Arbok launched into an actual normal wrap attack while Royal Kingler smacked some HACs upside the head, and Jigglypuff…was…um…hiding somewhere it would seem.
"Hey, you didn’t comment on me being sarcastic, Narrator!"

?
SARCASTIC? What PART was SARCASTIC!

"Um…the all-mighty part?"
A part of the ceiling came loose for no apparent reason and conked Eric square in the head. It stunned him a little, but didn’t appear to do too much damage.
Meanwhile Arbok lashed out at a HAC, biting it right on the little squeaky nose.

BOOM!

In a flash Arbok and HAC were thrown in opposite directions, both smashed into a wall and hit the ground with those swirly-anime eyes.
"What the…"

HACs say they have GRENADE NOSES!

"Grenade noses?"

HACs pull off SQUEAKY NOSES and PREPARE to DEMONSTRATE!

"I have a bad feeling about this…"
Suddenly a large part of the wall the HAC hit collapsed caved in, followed immediately by a massive, familiar armor clad figure charging in, spraying weapons fire everywhere. Only naturally this startled the HACs and caused quite a few of them to drop their noses…
You can imagine what happened next…in just a few seconds later there were a lot more clowns plastered to the walls. Also a few trainers/extras were creamed by the explosions.
MMGHAM, almost decoratively adorned with clown bits, started firing, scaring off the few remaining HACs…and accidentally blowing the hac out of an innocent extra, but what’s that matter, he saved everyone else, right?
"Let’s get out of here everyone!"
‘Action Man looked around a second, then back at the hole he made in the wall and saw everyone had already bolted. Shrugging, he turned to head outside again, scooping up Sabrina who’d been conveniently forgotten in the rush to get away.

In front of the building:
"All right troops, move in!"
A few HACs fidgeted nervously as their only response.
One came up to the commander trembling and said, "Um…that big guy’s in there you know…that Macho Action Gung-Ho call me Mister Man?"
"It’s Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man you imbecile! Anyway, I know that! We can’t turn tail and run at every tough opponent, NOW CHARGE!"
Deciding that potential disintegration was favorable to assured psychic death, about 50 HACs followed the orders and charged in, only to find nobody inside.
Bam-Boom at this point fired a few missiles that caused the hospital to collapse in on itself, and the HACs.
The commander stared on at the scene, and growled "Idiots, charging into an unknown situation like that!"
"But, sir, you…"
The commander pulled out a large gun and repeatedly shot the subordinate until he fainted.
"All right everyone, secure this city! It might not be much, but then again, there’s not much left of Aqua Version."
As the HACs made efforts to fortify their position in Saffron City and a few citizens left for cover with MMGHAM, …Mike, was still hopelessly lost.
"AAAAAAAARRRRRGGGG!!!!!!! WHERE IS CIVILIZATION!?!?!"
"Haunter, haunt, haunter er haunt!"
"What?"

Ally HAUNTER says at least you’re out of the DESERT!

"Oh some relief that is… Now instead of carcasses everywhere in sweltering heat, there’s lava everywhere and subsequent boiling heat. Where the heck did a series of cliffs, jagged rocks and lava pools come from anyway?"

Ally HAUNTER says it’s probably a great geological split from when VENOM DEATHPUFF split the planet in half!

"I guess that almost makes sense… Anyway, how do we get out of here? The tactic we had of "going in a straight line until we hit civilization" just didn’t work."
To emphasize his point Mike points at a massive river of lava barring the way of the straight-line course. Haunter merely does the equivalent of a shrug.
"Some help you are…"

LAVADOS appeared!

Mike spun around to look at the lava just as a colossal column of the molten rock began to rise up and take shape. The swirling mass took on a serpent-like appearance not much unlike a Gyarados.
"Lavados? That sounds familiar for some reason…is it a rip-off of something?"

NARRATOR thinks the name does sound a little familiar! …but in this case LAVADOS is an evolved form of GYARADOS!

"Oh fun. I suppose it wants to fight?"

MIKE is CATCHING ON!

The "Lavados" looked in Mike and Haunter’s direction and its eyes glinted in a menacing squint. It then reared back and fired a massive beam at the two, throwing Mike in one direction as Haunter scooted off to another.

Enemy LAVADOS used MEGA BEAM!

"Huh…why does this seem so familiar? Go Deathkarp!"
Mike tossed out a Pokéball and a skeletal-looking Magikarp emerged. To complete the look there was a little scythe apparently attached to its flipper somehow.

Not far away another figure looked around trying to determine where he was. Clenching his right hand into a fist he crushed the compass he had been holding.
"Stupid piece of junk!"
As he started to wipe off some sweat with a bandanna he started to hear fighting off in the distance. Well, something familiar at any rate, he decided he’d join in, more interesting than wandering around in his eternally lost state.

"Ok everyone, we’ll stay here and be ready to hold off the HACs once they start mobilizing for the next city. I want you all to go into the next city and get them ready to fight off the HAC army."
Bam-Boom finished telling everyone of his plans to stop the invasion from Black Version, although he left room for some deviance from MMGHAM (who could never really wait for heavy planning) and Eric (a mental hospital escapee, follow directions? Really…).
"I opt to stay here and help Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man and Bam-Boom!"
A Saffron Psychic, currently holding Sabrina’s unconscious form, glared at Eric and asked "Why would that be?"
"Well, you see, when Macho is in a fight, the safest place to be is behind him, and if he gets spun around during the fight, the city might not be behind him anymore."
The extras looked solemn suddenly, the MHE had a point…the nearest city wasn’t very far away at all and Bam-Boom had quite a range.
"Don’t worry, me not going to rubble-ize city. It’s not the heroic thing to do! I going to stop HACs! You get army to help!" ‘Action Man spat out in annoyed broken English.
For the most part he could use fairly decent grammar, but when he gets excited ‘Action Man has a tendency to sound like Grimlock.
The narrator chose this moment in time to but in with its booming voice.

MEGA HAC appeared!

"Huh?"
Everyone turned to look at the biggest clown they’d ever seen…it was almost as big as MMGHAM!

Enemy MEGA HAC used BIG CANNON!

The towering heavily armed clown whipped out a rather large firearm and fired it, blowing the psychic holding Sabrina off into the distance and hitting Eric in the head and causing him to tumble head over heels.
"GO! ME FIGHT HAC!"
Everyone did as the ‘Action Man said and took off for town, well everyone except that one extra, Sabrina, and Eric. Sabrina got blasted about and dropped in a ditch from the attack while the Extra landed face-first in the dirt some distance away.
Eric got up and rubbed his head, much to his dismay some of his hair was missing, burnt stubs were all that remained in a spot and the rest of it was messed up, covered in dirt with twigs and leaves stuck in it.
"AAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW HARD THIS HAIR IS TO MANAGE YOU INSENSITIVE PRICK OF A HAC?!?!"
Both Clown and Macho Man stared at Eric oddly. Eric leapt at the Mega HAC with hostile intent as was soon laying in with a viscous and merciless ankle-biting. …literally…
The HAC stumbled about and flailed as it tried to pry the MHE off. Eric looked very much like he was bound and determined to gnaw its foot off. With a few frenzied stomps from the Mega HAC he came loose though.
Sitting on the ground watching the birdies around his head, Eric began discussing the price of yo-yos in China with some invisible person. Meanwhile, MMGHAM and the Mega HAC began battling each other, they blew each others weapons out of their hands so they went hand-to-hand…pro-wrestling style. Well, almost, actually more of an old Godzilla-movie style really, but they’re so close it is kind of hard to tell the difference.
Sabrina sat up and shook her head weakly…today was sooo not her day. Could be worse…nevermind, it was worse; that MHE loser was still around.
Eric looked her way, looking like he’d been smacked senseless (not a hard feat…) and snarled "morning precious. Sleep well?"
"Just shut up, I’m not in the mood to deal with you."
Eric nodded, that must mean she’s still weak, otherwise he’d have received a nasty psychic blast. Shame, having a psychic cannon hanging around could be useful. As it was, the techno-magical mix weapon Bam-Boom would have to do.
Eric and Sabrina looked up with a jolt as they heard something. That something, a quartet of HACs with large weapons at the ready. A quick look at ‘Action Man showed he was currently engaged, (busy trying to twist the Mega HAC’s head off its over-muscled shoulders), and Sabrina was still down. That left only one option…Eric would have to do something if there was no visible escape route. …nope, no way out. Oh well.
"Stay back, I’ll handle this."
Out of no where a disco ball appeared and weird lighting filled the area. Eric quickly donned a disco outfit and some costume Jigglypuff ears. As the music started up Eric went into action, dancing and singing to the music. Only thing was, it was in Jigglypuff-ese.
"Jigg, a-a lee-eeee-eeee-eeee-eeee Puu-UUU-UUU-uuu-UUU-UUFF!!!"
Spinning about the dance floor he made quite a show with a number of Jigglypuff toys and figurines. Needless to say, a minute or two of this and all the HACs were down on the ground, having blasted themselves with their own high-caliber weaponry.

Eric turned around hands out and said haughtily "Ha, who is da man?"
MMGHAM was sitting on the ground, Bam-Boom aside on the ground, with his helmet on crooked and Sabrina was also on the ground, rubbing a slight bruise on her cheek.
Sabrina glared at Eric and said; "Warn us the next time you’re going to do something like that!"
Eric raised an eyebrow and looked like he was about to say something but the narration cut him off.

Allies hurt themselves in their confusion!

"Oh. Oops, sorry about that."

Meanwhile, in Saffron City, the HACs had taken a rather interesting captive. The "Dark Warrior" was currently tied up, and some HACs were looking at his weapon trying to figure out what it was.
"It’s a sword."
"No way…That thing is more of a porcupine than a sword."
"Well, the narrator and I call it a sword."
The clown frowned as he sarcastically replied, "Yeah, well Godzilla calls tanks and jets toys."
Dark Warrior just shrugged best he could.
A different HAC walked up and attempted to pick up the weapon, but it was far to spiked and pointy and he fainted himself before he ever got a handhold.
"How do you pick this thing up?" inquired the head HAC.
"Untie me and I’ll show you."
"Haha. Like I’m falling for that one."
"Drat."
The clown started to laugh but suddenly smoke enveloped the area, and the sounds of something heavy hitting people could be heard. When it cleared Dark Warrior was standing on some KO’d clowns, waiting for the smoke to clear so that he could pick up his weapon.
"Hold it!" the clown started to go for one of its many weapons, but Dark Warrior didn’t comply with the order.
Instead he started spinning around at super-speed, classic cartoon tornado style. The HAC jumped back and pulled out his gun and was about to fire, but Dark disappeared under the ground. Almost instantly Dark emerged behind him and knocked the HAC out.
Weaving his arm into the mass of blades that he called a sword he "humph"ed in disgust and said; "Oldest trick in the book…"
Dark Warrior proceeded to slip out of camp, knocking out quite a few HACs and getting some info on their battle plans. Only oversight was that he missed the tank coming his way, got smashed, and thusly recaptured.
"Man, this sucks."

Meanwhile Mike and Ryoga were expressing similar sentiments about battling a massive Gyarados evolution made of lava. Mike ran out of the way of the lava blast, throwing rocks at the pseudo Pokémon while others in his party used more effective attacks. Deathkarp fired a last thunder before being swatted away and fainted, Haunter lashed out with Night Shade attacks while trying to dodge the return fire. Charmeleon used firespin to hold the Lavados down whenever it stopped trying to fry Mike. Ryoga had been throwing boulders and other heavy objects at it, but came up with a different idea and was currently sneaking around behind it.
"HOT!! HOT!!!!" Mike wailed as he hoped about trying to cool his foot off.
"LUCKY HIT!!!" Mike yelled as he stuck his foot in the sand, slightly cooling off his foot.
Unfortunately, this had the side-effect of turning the sand to glass and Mike couldn’t move his foot out.
"Ah man!!"
Haunter flew through the Lavados and hit it with a few psychic attacks to divert its attention. After all, if Mike died…who would give it candy? Oh sure, it could find someone else but that would take time.
Haunter scrambled out of the way of a fiery blast just as it noticed Ryoga perched atop a cliff face. Looked like Ryoga had a plan. Haunter, however, wasn’t about to trust someone with Ryoga’s IQ and zipped out of range to recharge. The Lavados followed Haunter, and happened to move underneath Ryoga’s perch. As it passed under Ryoga punched the ground with all his strength and sent the entire fraggin’ cliff face crashing down on the monster. Haunter, Mike, and Charmeleon all gave appraising looks and gestures, up until the Lavados burst out of the rocks that had buried it. It didn’t get far though and just fell over.
Everyone blinked at the sight for half a second before cheering. Mike and Ryoga high-fived as the Pokémon danced around cheering. Mike then looked at his arm, trying to make out the signals he was getting from it…did it just flat out go numb from the strength of Ryoga’s high-five or was it in screaming pain? Somehow…it seemed to be both.
Ryoga freed Mike’s foot and he recalled Charmeleon and Deathkarp. Then they set back out "on the road" trying to…well, find a road.

PG-13 section of Fanfic: Please skip if you’re under 13 or easily offended.

Things went quietly for quite a while, but soon Mike had to blurt something in.
"You know, I notice the webmaster and narrator seem to show favoritism to at least two characters."
"Haunter haunt haunter?"

1) NARRATOR shows FAVORITISM to NO ONE!
(unless the bribe is enough)
2) HAUNTER wants to know who!

"Well, in this case…Sabrina and Ryoga, two copyrighted characters."

Ally HAUNTER says continue!

"I know the webmaster isn’t too biased unless he’s a really big fanboy of something, or…"
Ryoga looked at Mike funny, but kept walking. If the webmaster wanted to spare him from too much pain and suffering, he wasn’t going to argue.

NARRATOR and HAUNTER would like to know where MIKE is going with this!

"I’m thinking…treatment of Ryoga is a lot like Sabrina’s, this says something to me because I know the webmaster has a crush on Sabrina."
Everyone…no, everything suddenly stopped dead. Mike smirked and looked skywards.
"I do believe I’ve hit on the answer! Our webmaster has a thing for anime characters and is showing some definite bi-ness here! Come on, admit it oh "all-mighty" one!"
Everything was silent a second longer, and then whamo! The sky was ablaze with lightning bolts lashing down to the ground! At the same spot to boot.
A scrawny figure could be made out sizzling at the point of repeated impact, going into typical cartoon convulsions as bolt after bolt of lightning nailed him. After the lightning let up Mike was nothing more than cinders in a hole blasted in the ground.
Mike re-formed, coughed, and wearily said, "My, I think I hit a nerve."
Just then a meteorite slammed into Mike’s head knocking him out.

No, NARRATOR believes THAT hit a NERVE!

The ever-"helpful" narrator supplied.
Ryoga stood still, looking for all the world like he was in shock, and weakly muttered out, "I…I…feel so...so…violated."
At that point Ryoga got a few lightning bolts to the head himself, and the scene abruptly changed.

Somewhere in the real world a teenager huffily got off his computer and paced around muttering things like "the nerve..." "My own characters…" "can’t believe someone would say something like that…" and so on. For about an hour and a half. After he was done he went back to typing, still seething a little bit.

Resuming PG-Rating: Ok, now you can re-join the story. Don’t worry, no vital plot points happened here.
‘Action Man, Sabrina, and Eric were on the road. Bam-Boom had gotten some information on HAC movement via some nifty flying spy-cams, and the trio headed to intercept. They’d been hiking about an hour and ‘Action Man was seriously feeling like cutting down the number of people on this trip.
"Just SHUT UP Sabrina! Being a Gym-Leader does not make you a tactical expert!"
"Oh, and being a mental hospital escapee makes you one?! Oh, and just try and make me shut up psycho boy!"
"Don’t tempt me!" Eric said stepping forward, fist raised.
Sabrina stepped forward too, matching Eric’s evil-eye glare. Those goofy anime-sparks started shooting between their foreheads as the stood there.
At that point MMGHAM stepped in between them and shoved them both backwards, shaking his head sadly. He was thinking maybe it would have been better to have left them with the HACs.
"You two need to be quiet."
Bam-Boom added "Yes, we don’t want to attract the attention of dozens, maybe even hundreds of HACs."
Sabrina and Eric nodded, and didn’t argue the rest of the trip. But, they did give each other the evil eye the whole way there. Eric wasn’t nearly as convincing though since his eyes don’t glow and his left eye likes to wander.
Half an hour later they met up with fellow members of the Hammy-HAC resistance. Eric and Sabrina got their Pokémon healed by a commando-Nurse Joy, and Bam-Boom and a few others set up a meeting to discuss battle strategy.
Commando Nurse Joy and her contingent of battle-Chanseys with Chainsaws would hold off one invasion force, while Lorelei and a few other really tough Pokémon trainers would cause a diversion elsewhere. MMGHAM and Bam-Boom would hold off the forces headed to take over Saffron’s neighboring cities (which meant a 180-degree turn…-not that Macho knew that). Other various extras were sent off to help build up defenses in various cities. Shortly afterwards they received news that some of Mammy’s HACs were on the move and started mobilizing.

Eric was oddly trying to get on the side of the trainers going on the offensive. This made no sense to anyone, up until he started hitting on Lorelei…
Lorelei didn’t seem to notice, but did turn to Sabrina after a few minutes.
"You and ‘Action Man brought him in, didn’t you?"
Sabrina hung her head sadly and gave a pained "yes."
Sabrina just hid her face, up until Eric glomp-hugged Lorelei and shouted "PAY ATTENTION!"
Sabrina roughly man-handled him away, kicking him as she drug him and shouted in his ear "NO ONE CAN TAKE YOU ANYWHERE CAN THEY?!?!"
Eric just looked up and grinned goofily. Sabrina sighed and psy-whaped him as hard as she could. He went flying and sprawled out on the concrete painfully as she expected, but the twist was that there were two of him now.
Both Erics got up, one immediately groaned, while the other grinned like a maniac (gee, big surprise).
"HA! I’m free!"
"Not for long!"
"I’m not going back, I’m going the way of Fanboy!"
One of the Erics jumped up and walked over to Sabrina, "You know, I don’t see why he doesn’t like you. You’re not trying to kill us anymore."
Just about everyone in the area looked at the scene with a face-fault. Eric got up, but made no move against his escaped personality.
"Ah, I didn’t know it was you."
The escaped Eric nodded and said, "It’s me all right! None of the others liked me much, but now I can be my own person!"
The main Eric glared and said, "You’ve been more trouble than any personality is worth."
Noticing the puzzled looks Eric decided to add some more information.
"Err…Fanboy was the first escaped personality, he was the one that went online and argued over x vs. y battles and bought toys of all our favorite stuff. This here is…"Glompo", effectively my perverted side that has gotten me beat up in earlier battles, and in a lot of trouble. Most notably with the Cerulean Sisters, Erika, Sabrina, and…Lorelei just now."
The blink was simultaneous and audible. They knew Eric had some weird secrets, but this…bah, it was out of line for even Aqua!
The new Eric grinned and quickly grabbed Sabrina and Lorelei, pulling them in for a quick group hug before bouncing away into the distance shouting at everyone.
"I’ll see you later dark, psychic mistress, and you too you ice-babe with the oh-so-well developed Pokémon!"
The main Eric, as Lorelei and Sabrina shuddered in disgust, shook his fist at the escaping personality and yelled, "GOOD RIDDANCE YOU SICK EXPLENITIVE DELETED!!!"
Sabrina regained herself to fire a few psychic bolts at "Glompo" but he was out of range at the time.
Sabrina calmly turned to Eric and asked "So, now we have your perverted personality running around loose?"
Eric just nodded.
Sabrina’s eyes flashed and she said, "I’m going to kill it."
Lorelei stepped up and said "Not if I kill it first."
Eric looked both of them in the eyes and grinned, "I wish you the best of luck. Now that I have no reason to be in this group…I think I’ll go…um…help fortify one of the cities, yeah!"


Eric took off like a shot, not even leaving enough time for anyone to hit him with anything. After everyone slightly recovered over the rather disturbing incident they moved out. Big war to win against Mammy and then Hammy ya know. More on these fights to be covered in traditional Pokébattle style!

Meanwhile, Mike, Ryoga and Haunter saw the first of any buildings they’d seen in weeks. Only, something was off… for one thing, the clowns bearing heavy firepower swarming all over the city was a dead give-away something was wrong.
"Um…something’s been going on I don’t know about…" said Mike.
The three snuck up closer and listened in on what the HACs where doing. They only got close enough to hear an army-style marching chant.
Lead HAC: "I don’t know, but I’ve been told!"
Goo…err…Troops: "I don’t know but I’ve been told!"
"Aqua Version’s gonna fold!"
"Aqua Version’s gonna fold!"
Mike gasped and said, "Ack! Some megalomaniac from another version has sent a viscous army of heavily armed clowns to take over Aqua Version!"
Ryoga and Haunter nod. Sure, it was a heck of a conclusion, but…hey, why not?
Mike stood up, posing dramatically and said, "There’s only one thing to do!"
Ryoga nodded and punched his fist into his palm, ready for action.
"Get the hell out of here before they see us!" finished Mike.
Ryoga and Haunter fall over like Anime characters are prone to do.
"What?! You mean you aren’t going down there to beat the stuffing out of them to defend your home version?!"
Mike shook his head and said, "No, all my Pokémon are ready to drop. If I have to fight once my Pokémon are healed, I’ll do it…but until then, I’m running!"
Mike tried to, but Ryoga hauled him up by the back of his shirt leaving Mike treading air.
"Are you afraid to do battle yourself you coward?!"
Mike spun around to face Ryoga, looked him straight in the eye and answered, "Yes, because you and I are different people. I am totally unlike you in that I CANNOT BENCH PRESS A CITY BUS!!!"
Mike and Ryoga then immediately snapped their heads around to look at where the "Cha-chink" noises had come from… About 50 HACs had found them.
"Oh boy…"

Is Mr. Macho Gung-Ho Action Man the only hope for Aqua Version? Will Eric or Mike ever grow a backbone? How slow and painfully will Eric’s newest rouge personality die? How much damage will Hammy’s general Mammy do to this already decimated world? Find out…whenever I get to updating again!

(Disclaimer: Don’t read if you’re young enough you skipped over the PG-13 bit. Also don’t bother if you ignored the warning and didn’t get, or were sickened by, Mike’s teasing the "webmaster."

Oh, but before I go any further…don’t expect ‘Glompo’ to have a long life…or many appearances.

Actually, the Mike character doesn’t have a point, as far as I know I only get crushes on girls, I just thought it would be funny. –not that being gay or "bi" is wrong at all. I have an online friend who likes both James and Cassidy of Team Rocket…um, err…I’m rambling for absolutely no reason at all now.) 1